COVID-19 Response: Delivery service for the community

Posted on 26 Mar 2020

e-ducare.org is looking to partner with other charities to take on a major task that will might save a lot of lives during this pandemia, by reducing the exposure of Irish people. We are also interested in linking up with local authorities and businesses.

Details about the project

As we all know by now the world is under great pressure to cope with COVID-19. Ireland is not immune and so far, has taken important steps in containing the spread of the virus. Looking at our neighbours, the situation will get more and more difficult in the coming days and will last for many weeks if not months.

In times like these the sense of community must come together as we need to support each other. We need to support those workers that are fighting for us, for our wellbeing. We must protect the most vulnerable people and we must also protect our economy as much as we can.

 

We aim to build a collaboration between charities, the local authorities and the businesses to arrange a free delivery service for the general public.

This is a unique opportunity that we have, to setup a service that will reduce the footfall while keeping the businesses going. This will allow people not only to keep their jobs, but also to be less exposed to COVID-19 in their workplace. This project will positively impact our economy, reduce the spread of the virus among our community which, in turn, will reduce the strain on our health system.

The ecosystem and how it will work

The ecosystem is composed by the companies, charities and local authorities. We will begin in the Dublin area but ideally, we would like to cover the whole country.

The companies will be able to have access to an extended network of customers. Up to today not all shops have an e-commerce platform and/or a delivery system (an example is Dunnes). For us is important to give an opportunity to big stores like Dunnes to be open and also to give our customers (the general public) the freedom of choice. At today only Tesco has a proper delivery system set in place, but it will get overwhelmed very quickly. In this project the businesses will be in charge of putting together the order and will work with us to setup a proper payment system. Our volunteers will just collect the order from the store and delivered to the address.

The Charities are one of the most crucial part of this project. We aim to, not only help the general public, but also promote awareness. This crisis impacts our society in many aspects, and all are relevant in someway or another to our mission and values. Charities have a great network of volunteers and connections that can enable this project to succeed.

Local Authorities will facilitate our project and their support will guarantee our acceptance across industry and communities.

Volunteers needed

The project requires people with a diverse set of skills and also requirements.

  • Volunteer for project management: 1
  • Volunteers for delivery: about 200 for Dublin

    Healthy young people (less than 40 years old) holding a valid driver's licence and car to deliver the groceries in their neighbourhood.
    • The numbers of volunteers needed are based on the areas to be covered (size) and availability.
  • Volunteers to manage the orders: 10 for Dublin
    • To receive the orders and send them to the appropriate store
    • Contact the person in charge of the delivery
    • Arrange the payment (need to be discussed the way)
  • Volunteers to promote the project: 4 for Dublin
    • Marketing campaigns to promote the project
    • Find businesses
  • Volunteers for the legal aspects (i.e. Ts&Cs): 1
  • Volunteers for the digital aspect: TBD
    • Tracking orders and payments (phase I)
    • Develop online platform (phase II)

If you are interested please contact Luca at l.mancinelli@e-ducare.org